Ten words for Kyouya
by Sambucivox
Summary: Ten drabbles about Kyouya's life and miracles, from the point of view of his nearest and dearest. You'll have to read between the lines to find the pairings. Rated T for violence, mostly. COMPLETE.
1. Perfect

Disclaimer: Ouran is the mindbaby of Hatori Bisco.

Author's notes: This is the translation of a drabble collection that I wrote for the Spanish section of ffnet. Please, don't write me angry e-mails saying that I plagiarized an amazing Spanish Writer. ;-)

I'd like to thank Kryssa's Flute for the amazing work that she made beta-ing the translated text. It's only thanks to her that you won't bump across mutant, pseudo-medical terms and weird sentence structures.

And without further ado, I present you with Kyouya's birth.

* * *

** 1. PERFECT**

Yoshio Ootori's first three children were born into the world naturally and without complications, or as naturally as it is to be born surrounded by the latest technology in a room sterilized by a hypochondriac.

Just like every newborn, they were, for more than a week, little bundles of red, wrinkled flesh, with their heads deformed by the effort of pushing.

The fourth, the "accident", refused to struggle to the point that he didn't even turn around inside the uterus when the time came.

The sonographer showed them that he had tied up the chord around his waist and chest, just like a primitive safety belt.

His little left hand pulled it at regular intervals, as if he was calling the room service.

Yoshio frowned and ordered his doctors, from his New York office, to perform a c-section in his wife.

Kyouya was, from his first breath, a perfect baby.


	2. Moral

**2. SYMBOLISM**

Ouran was a school for the high class, and the high class loved appearances. For that reason even the richest toddlers had to pass a series of IQ tests, fine motor skills and vocabulary exams, followed by a battery of psychological tests.

However, Yuzuru believed that you could know more about a child by playing with him for half an hour than with making him look at fifteen different ink stains. His Tamaki had been his guinea pig.

But his _friend'_s youngest wasn't at all like Tamaki.

For starters, Kyou-chan had sprinted to the shelves, ignoring the tasty mountain of toys at the corner, and had asked Yuzuru to read him a tale, the one he preferred.

The headmaster felt like a subject under observation as he read The Ugly Duckling.

"I don't like the moral of this tale," attacked the child the moment he finished reading. The boy's brilliant black eyes were glistening with suspicion. "The duckling is saved just because he's a swan. Not because he's smart or courageous."

Yuzuru's mouth went dry. Tamaki had cried an ocean with that story, and his own heart shrunk a little bit every time he read it.

"Kyou-chan, aren't you sad for the duckling?"

The boy frowned, thoughtful.

"A little bit, at the beginning. When its family doesn't love him. But after that he does nothing but fooleries. Staying put in the country in the middle of winter..." he shrugged, a mute _i would have never done that_ "...or trusting that hag, it was clear that she wanted to eat him." His voice trembled, and Yuzuru couldn't tell whether it was out of anger or sadness. "The ending is even worst. He goes back to the swans."

"But that is a good thing, isn't it?"

"They're the ones who abandoned him to the ducks."

Yuzuru called the interview to an end. When the child closed the door at his back, he played with the idea of calling Yoshio Ootori to explain him a few things about being a father and creating bonds of trust and love with the kids.

But a sense of unease told him that, to the Ootoris, he would sound like an idiotic ugly duckling, so he let it be.

* * *

_Inspired by a real life experience at the German School in Madrid._


	3. Explorer

**3. EXPLORER**

The muslin curtain caressed Fuyumi's cheek. Her brother was sliding in the dark like a pixie explorer, as scared as she had been when she was his age.

Fuyumi complained, still half asleep, when the boy's feet stroke her calf. The way from the north wing was long and cold.

"Nightmare?" she asked, drawing her words.

Kyouya didn't answer, but he went rigid and grabbed the collar of her nightgown. Fuyumi couldn't turn on the lights to comfort him, though she wanted to. The last time that she had glimpsed the tears of Kyouya, he had run out the bedroom and hadn't returned for two months. However, the nightmares went on; the dark circles under his eyes told that tale.

"Did you dream about the eagle again?"

The pull almost burned her nape. Fuyumi took the child into her arms and swayed him – not much, for that could also provoke an escape.

"It's just a dream, Kyou-chan. The eagles don't eat people. And if you were tied up to a cliff, Tachibana would run to untie the knots and I would wait for you under it, with a superduperbig mat." She caressed his hair and the boy relaxed a little bit.

Fuyumi didn't tell him that she had dreamt about the same thing, or that Akito too had sought refuge in the night, or that the firstborn Ootori showed the same dark circles under his eyes until he was twelve.

Kyouya left before dawn.


	4. Fear

**4. FEAR**

Why did Kyouya have to humiliate him? He had only offered him an orange. He was only talking about how good they tasted, how good their skin was.

And that look from Kanan. Takeshi felt fear when he saw it, a pure glint of admiration...

...that wasn't for him, but for that...

...he was one of the _small kids..._

..._M__om_ had asked him to _take care_ of the smaller boy...

... Kyouya didn't even like fruit, or desserts, and he always passed on cake at the birthday parties...

...or maybe he passed only at Takeshi's parties?...

Kanan covered the sun when she kneeled in front of him. The ribbons that tied her plaits were white. Maybe Kyouya did eat her cake.

"Do you wanna play with me?" the girl asked, smiling sweetly. "Kyouya's a bore. He always wins,"

An aftertaste of citric hope.


	5. Chess

**5. CHESS**

Hani produced a white and pink chessboard and challenged us. There were bets, and Tono decided that we would have to play in teams of two. Us, Haruhi and him and Hani-sempai and Mori-sempai.

His Majesty and Haruhi were the first to fall. For the shepherd's mate. In two movements, which is kind of a record. We didn't, but the fool's massacre screwed up our strategy and ruined our plans to use a fake guillotine when he deposed his King. Hani was about to claim victory over the Club –and to reclaim his prize, a wedding cake with seven layers- when our Shadow King, who had been making out with his calculator in his corner, chose whites.

"Ten seconds between moves," and he threw a stop watch in Haruhi's direction, "You'll be in charge of that,"

In the end, Kyouya did something with the Queen and a pawn and managed to draw Mori's towers out of the board. Hani used his turn to menace the white king with the pink ponies. Kyouya smiled and cut a diagonal line with his Queen to protect the King.

Hani bit his lower lip.

"Five seconds," Haruhi said.

"Oh, sorry. I forgot," Kyouya removed his glasses and wiped the lenses with a piece of suede, smiling all the while. "Check mate."

The white Queen touched the crown of Hani-sempai's King with her shadow, and the same pawn that had drove the towers to perdition kept him from moving.

Hani and Mori had to dress up as Teletubbies for a whole week.


	6. Sun

**6. SUN**

Kyouya doesn't like to suntan. He says that it's bad for the skin and that it's one of the causes of cancer, and that only an idiot like me would soak up in coconut oil instead of using sunscreen.

I think that he means it; whenever we go to the beach or to the pool he never removes his shirt, unless he's going to swim. And he seldom swims.

Though… he removed it this afternoon and to give it to Haruhi, after I rescued her. But that's different, of course. That's... chivalry.

And the sun was setting, too.

Yet even though he never suntans, he always carries sunburn lotion.

And he's always right. Because I got burned – my skin and my good spirits.

I think I'll go to his room and ask him for a bit of both.


	7. Misinterpretation

**7. MISINTERPRETATION**

Kyouya is the most difficult out of them. I never know how he's going to react when facing a problem.

I can predict that the reaction will be _intelligent _and _full of merits _(for whom?), but those terms are empty shells that don't explain his smile, sweet and cold like a popsicle, nor the precision of his fingers when they type –_credit-_ an Excel sheet.

When he's in good spirits he touches me; his palm on my shoulder, and his breath whispering percentages about kisses in the shell of my ear. Also, he may be trying to remark –_teach _- something; a hand too firm that pulls and holds, a knee too bold in a place that could lead to misinterpretation if didn't I already know that that reaction wouldn't be intelligent nor full of merits (for anyone).

This is the problem right now:

The velvet and the chiffon are swollen up with the water; they are heavy and I can't help but become drawn to the bottom of the pool. My brain has been gassed by the chlorine and refuses to help me find the way out of this ridiculous costume. And the last thing that my eyes have seen was Tamaki running towards the crown.

And it was Kyouya with his poker smile, his gag hands and his veiled voice that's put me in this spot.

I hope that he has the decency of jumping and personally saving me instead of delegating the task.


	8. Phone

**8. PHONE**

Haruhi was chatting with the Hitachiin and she said,

"You have to take a grip on yourselves, if Kyouya hadn't stop you, you would have killed those pimps at the beach."

Mitsukuni and I exchanged a glance.

Kyouya didn't stop the beating – _w__e _did.

When we got to the top of the cliff we found Kyouya leaning over a rock, using his cell phone to ask for a doctor. _For Haruhi._

Hikaru and Kaoru were still kicking the unconscious bodies of the two bullies. Their faces were as red as the blood that dripped down their swimming trunks.

A seagull cried at the summit of the sky, and Kyouya closed his cell phone. He glared at us. On the other side of the glass, his eyes were brilliant and furious.

"Are you going to help them?"

I never knew if he was talking about the twins or about the bullies.


	9. Labyrinth

**9. LABYRINTH**

We walked into the labyrinth as soon as the evil Journalism Club gave up. It smelled really nice, and the grass was so soft and the air was so warm that I took off my shoes and my socks.

I thought that Takashi would be able to track Haru's and Tama's scent, but he said that the roses covered up their scent, and that too many couples had walked over the grass that afternoon to follow the marks of one.

So we started to wander, with Hika and Kao in the middle telling jokes, and Kyou-chan guiding the march. Every once in a while he stopped, thoughtful, and caressed the petals of a rose as he looked at the sky.

A little bit later, when we turned a corner, we walked into Tama and Haru, who were sleeping inside a granite gazebo.

"We were really lucky, ne?" I told Kyou-chan on our way back. "It was good that we didn't have to wander for hours and hours, 'cause I was getting hungry."

"Luck had nothing to do with it. I put myself into Tamaki's shoes, and that's why we found them," he said, pointing his hand at a rosebush. "That's an American Beauty. His favorite variety; it has no thorns. It's also hot today, and, with the running and the stifling uniforms, I supposed that he would prefer to walk in the shade. And around here there's only one gazebo where he can sit down and seduce Haruhi."

"Wow! How impressive, Kyou-chan!"

"You think? It worries me to know that I can put myself into the head of that idiot," he replied with his _true_ smile.


	10. Destiny

**10. DESTINY**

**(Spoilers up to chapter 54)**

Tamaki taught me that every man chooses his own destiny. He should walk his talk.

The moment he decided to save his mother, he renounced control of his own.

That idiot sometimes thinks himself Romeo and sometimes Mother Teresa and always forgets to watch for his own interests. It's pathetic. If I were him, I would have never created this Club.

If I were in his shoes, I would have strived to please that sphinx of a grandmother until she publicly announced me as a heir. And then I would have returned to France.

* * *

Of course, if he had done that, I would have never stepped out of my frame.

I would have never learned to manipulate the desires and the needs of the designators.

I would have only met passive, fussy little ladies, instead of getting to know Haruhi the brutal commoner.

If Tamaki hadn't crucified his destiny, I wouldn't even have one.

* * *

The Ootoris do not owe favors to anyone.

_This_ is a physical need.

It's stronger than sleeping and eating and breathing the fresh air of Fontainebleau.

That's why I won't stop – _I can't stop _– until I find – redeem_ – _his mother.

Partly to thank her.

And partly to have her help me give Tamaki back his destiny – and his favors.


End file.
